I'm always intrigued to find songs that have links to where I live. It's fun to see what connotations they give to the area that I love - the place I call home! I use an exclamation mark here because most songs about the East End of London are less than flattering. Anyway here are the few I've found, all bar the last one within a mile of our house...1. The Rolling Stones - 'Play With Fire' (Out of our Heads, 1965). This is actually one of my favourite Stones songs - loved it long before I'd even heard of Stepney. The song is about a relationship with a privileged girl whose mother is condemned to 'gets her kicks in Stepney not in Knightsbridge anymore' since her father took her privileges away. I'm not sure what kind of 'kicks' were available here in the '60s but since it was the Kray brothers stamping ground back then I don't suppose they were particularly glamourous! Listen here...
2. The Libertines - 'Can't Stand Me Now' (The Libertines, 2004). It was quite amusing to discover when we moved to London that we lived in the same street as Pete Doherty, formerly of The Libertines. We only discovered it when there was a notice of his trial for possession of drugs in the local press and his street address was given. After that wild rumours would sweep the street from time to time - neighbours claiming they'd seen Kate Moss, his girlfriend at the time, going to his flat. Obviously we saw nothing and he's now moved house! Apparently he's an East-End boy, born and bred. My favourite song of his has to be 'Can't Stand You Now' - it's a fabulous song. The lyrics are very clever - a conversation between two people at the break-up of a relationship giving the two points of view. You have to listen to it to make sense of which voice is which. Listen here...
3. Pulp - 'Mile End' (Different Class Deluxe Edition, 2006). Of all the Brit-pop bands, for me Pulp are the only ones with any lasting credibility. Oasis seem horribly dated already but Pulp's music, perhaps because of its quirkiness, still stands up to the test of time. 'Mile End' is a song about the time when Jarvis Cocker and friends lived in the East End and his description of life there in the big tower blocks is less than appealing - but unfortunately still pretty true to life in the places I go to from time to time. 'Burdett Road' in the song is only 5 mins walk from ours! Listen here...
4. Traditional - 'Oranges and Lemons'. Have you ever considered the lines to the nursery rhyme 'Oranges and Lemons say the bells of St Clements etc...' If you've read Orwell's 1984 no doubt you have. Well it's a pretty grim ending! However, the bells of Stepney feature and they refer to the bells of the Church of St Dunstans right next to where we live.
5. Jools Holland - 'Brick Lane' (A-Z Geographer's Guide to the Piano, 1995). When I was at university a friend lent me a tape of some Jools Holland songs - it opened up with 'Brick Lane' named after the legendary street in East London laden with curry houses. The song, if I remember rightly (it's been a while since I heard it) has people from the street speaking above the boogie-woogie piano. Little did I know back then whilst in a different city I was destined to live just down the road from Brick Lane and able to enjoy a meal out there from time to time.
6. Dizzee Rascal - 'Brand New Day' (Boy in Da Corner, 2003) I'm not a great fan of hip-pop, garage, rap and all the other forms of such music. I can appreciate it as a genuine musical form written and performed with skill but just don't like listening to it in great quantities. Some of the 'boyz' who live around me tell me Dizzee Rascal, a local boy, doesn't sing hip-pop he does 'grime', a musical sub-genre he invented. I've listened to a few of his tracks and much of it reflects the world of his youth in the East End. And yes grime would be an applicable term. Listen to 'Brand New Day here' here, one of his softer tracks.
7. Talking Heads - 'This Must be the Place (Naive Melody)' (Speaking in Tongues, 1983) And so to finish - a song that sums up 'home' for me. As a teenager Talking Heads were my favourite band. I came across them when the film Stop Making Sense was shown on BBC2 and I was blown away by the performance of David Byrne and the ever increasing band that builds up piece by piece over the concert. One of their more lovely tracks is This Must be the Place (Naive Melody). Watch below. I'm not sure what it's all about but it conjures up the feeling of home - the place that you feel settled in, the place where you love to be. The song I think suggests home is in the arms of a person you love. Well, I love where I live, it's where I want to be, with the people who live with me and alongside me. Call me naive, I don't care!
